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How to reset Windows 10 without losing files

August 5, 2018

Keep your music, videos and other files after resetting Windows

Wondering how you can reset Windows without losing all your files? The good news is that Windows 10 allows you to keep personal files while resetting your computer. So, what do you do to refresh Windows 10 without losing programs. Read on to find out how you can reset Windows 10 without losing files;

Reset this PC: Keep my files

To reset your Windows 10 PC while keeping your personal files, all that you need to is the following;

Search for “Setting,” on your PC

In Windows Settings, click on “Update and Security.”

This takes you to the Windows Update page. Here, click on “Recovery.”

In the Recovery windows, you will see the option to “Reset this PC.”

Click on the Get started button to begin resetting your PC.

This is where you find the “Keep my files,” option while resting your Windows 10 PC, along with the option to “Remove everything.”

Choose the Remove Everything Option while resetting Windows

This is a trick that I discovered a while back when my PC started giving me trouble. To reset Windows 10 without losing files, you need to move the files that you value the most into the Programs folder.

The Windows.old folder

See, what happens is that when you reset your Windows 10 PC, Windows does not really wipe clean all your files and folders. In fact, most of your programs are kept, to be used should you choose to restore your PC to the old version of Windows.

All of your files and folders are, therefore, kept in the Windows.old folder. You can actually find your files in there even when you have chosen to completely reset your PC.

Reset Windows 10 without losing files

After encountering problems with my Windows 10 computer, I decided, a while ago, to reset Windows 10 version 1803 via USB. I didn’t really have it in mind to reset Windows 10 without losing files.

All that I wanted to do was solve the Windows 10 version 1803 problem that I was having. In any case, after wiping my PC, I later discovered that some videos that I keep in a folder in Program Files had not been wiped clean . Don’t even ask what’s in the videos.

So, to keep your files while wiping your PC, create a folder in C:\Program Files. All the other videos, documents, etc that I had in the “Videos,” “Document,” etc was wiped clean, while everything in folders that are under C:\Program Files were retained.